CHICAGO — The city’s crazy streak of winter weather will continue this week, with record-breaking temperatures Tuesday followed by an icy plunge Wednesday.
The temperature record for Jan. 29 was shattered by 6:45 a.m. Tuesday, when the thermometer read 60 degrees, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Robert Castro.
Temperatures in Phoenix and San Francisco were only expected to reach the upper 50s Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service.
“It’s incredible,” Castro said. “It’s the beginning of the day and [the record] already broke.”
The record for the highest January temperature is 67 degrees, and forecasters were predicting a Tuesday high of 66 degrees, Castro said.
Chicago was under a flood watch Tuesday morning, as showers and thunderstorms are expected to roll through the region later in the day, he said.
More than 3 inches of rain could fall Tuesday.
Combine that with a still-frozen ground, and some areas could see a rapid rise of streams and rivers, as well as flooding of low-lying areas, Castro said.
“The amount of water that could be added by the storms today has nowhere to go,” he said.
Winter will return with a vengeance Wednesday, with temperatures expected to plummet to the mid-teens by Wednesday night, Castro said.
Temperatures will continue to drop Thursday and Friday, with highs in the teens, lows in the single digits and a negative wind chill, according to the weather service.
There have only been 33 January days with temperatures above 60 degrees in the last 141 years.
“This is really wild weather,” Castro said.
